ANNUAL PROGRESS CHECK-UP [IMPORTANT]

[Starry Starry Fright]

I know you guys always seem to dread these, but here it is: it's time for your annual progress check-up.

This is my chance, as headmistress of The Japanese Academy, to figure out exactly what it is that you need to improve on and what you've already mastered. I'll be using this to figure out the subjects we need to focus on in the coming months, so pay attention and fill out this easy, painless form below. I'll list a topic, and then you tell me how you're doing with it. Deal? To make it fair, I'll even fill out the form myself as an example.



Japanese Characters

Vocabulary

Basic Grammar

More Advanced Grammar

Understanding of Cultural Cues  

[Starry Starry Fright]

Starry Starry Fright is a good girl who always fills out simple evaluation forms when asked. Ahem.


Japanese Characters

I have Hiragana and Katakana completely mastered. I can recognize roughly 300 common kanji and consistently hand-write around 100 of those kanji with correct stroke order. My immediate goal for Japanese characters is to learn to write out the rest of my known kanji with correct stroke order.

Vocabulary

Not including verb conjugations, I probably have a working vocabulary of around 1,500 Japanese words. It might be a few hundred more or less than that; I'm not entirely sure. I've worked really hard to retain my vocabulary over the summer months and I'm sure I'll have to aggressively expand that to survive in 2nd year university Japanese. For now, my vocabulary is solid.

Basic Grammar

I'm absolutely steady on this. I can conjugate verbs between Dictionary form, ~masu form, ~TE form, ~TA form, past tense, present tense negative tense and past negative tense with relative ease. I can make solid sentences and use common expressions and greetings with ease. Basic grammar is the area that I'm least concerned with right now.

More Advanced Grammar

This is where most of my focus lies. So far, I've got a grip on compound sentences, requests, comparisons, invitations and the "te imasu" structure. Though I can write a decent personal essay, I definitely struggle with applying these rules to spoken conversations in real time; I find myself floundering and reverting to basic sentences where possible when I actually try to converse out loud on the fly. I know I need to practice the more advanced grammar I've learned, and get in as much listening and speaking practice as I can. I also tend to struggle with the grammar involved in giving advice and passing on a rumor.

Understanding of Cultural Cues

I understand basic culture cues - I know roughly when to use polite ~masu form and when I can use plain form, and I know how to properly extend and refuse an invitation. What I need to work on now is more advanced levels of formality - some of the extremely polite phrases used by shops and businesses still escape me, and I'm a little overwhelmed by the complicated formalities involved in gift-giving situations.




See? That wasn't so painful, was it?  

[Kai Shi]

Suppose as a crew member I should fill it out as well! biggrin

Japanese Characters Hiragana and katakana are down pat, characters...I can probably recognize somewhere in the range of 300-500 or so...Whether or not I get the proper readings is another matter. My writing of kanji has suffered greatly in the last year or two but hopefully will be picking up again soon.

Vocabulary
Is increasing daily here biggrin This is also the point that causes me the most trouble here though. There's just so much I don't know! And elementary kids have no problem pointing out my shortcomings redface watashi no nihongo wa mada heta desu ga, ganbarimasu!

Basic Grammar
Got it I think! It's daily use for me now so I'm getting a lot of use out of it.

More Advanced Grammar
Maaaan~ I get lost in grammar sometimes. When there's so much conjugation at the end of sentences I can get pretty confused. There's still plenty of grammar points for me to learn.

Understanding of Cultural Cues
Hopefully improving steadily! Keigo defeats me on a regular basis. I guess even though I hate it, I'm going to have to learn it. I'm always worrying whether or not I'm offending someone, so I'm trying to be pretty careful. It'd be nice if I could match my polite actions with some super polite Japanese.


Overall Goal
I need a stronger vocab and grammar base to pull on. Some grammar points I can understand in a written situation but can't yet make use of in daily conversation. More vocabulary is essential to my daily survival! Building more complex sentences when I speak would be nice too!  

[Tinlit]

I have not been studying at all but will fill this out. I want to take the N5 in 2013.

Japanese Characters
My hiragana is rusty, need to re-learn pretty much all of kata. I know 1 or two kanji but really need to work on this also

Vocabulary
My vocabulary is very small and I really need to work on the basics and core words

Basic Grammar
Grammar is pretty much at day one. I will need help studying grammar and learning it proper.

More Advanced Grammar
It is scary even thinking about it.

Understanding of Cultural Cues
I know some cues but am also a novice in this. I hope to learn much more over the next year.

Overall Goal
To work hard and take the N5 December 2013, like stated above. Even if I do not pass, having the kana's down and a more working vocab would be nice smile Also, to be more active here while I study  

[Nana Shinu Ai]

not only that. I would like more sentence structures with Japanese and English. I think your doing very well done job teaching me Japanese. I have to say your methods has helped me.  

[Bloody Rosen Knight]

Japanese Characters
Still learning
Vocabulary
got all the lessons down and study them, hoping for more lessons soon too
Basic Grammar
same as vocabulary
More Advanced Grammar
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Understanding of Cultural Cues
not a clue, still on grammar